Israel's assault on Gaza has opened a new chapter in the history of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. It is yet another signal that the focus of the Israel‑Palestine conflict is now urgently focused on the Gaza Strip and, more broadly, on relations between Israel and Hamas.

The election of Barack Obama offers the international community the opportunity for some new thinking about how to re-energise its commitment to end the occupation and create a sovereign, independent Palestine at peace with Israel. The selection of former senator George Mitchell, a mediator of international standing, as President Barack Obama's special envoy is widely viewed as an inspired choice.

As Mitchell begins a much-needed reassessment of the US-led effort to strengthen Fatah's Mahmoud Abbas and weaken Hamas, he inherits a US policy based upon the following principles. The first denies Hamas's role in Palestinian affairs, demands its adherence to the Quartet principles (recognition of Israel, foreswearing the use of force and accepting the Oslo-Annapolis agreements); and refuses to accept its rule in Gaza. The second involves acquiescing to Israel's diplomatic and security agenda on the West Bank, while offering only rhetorical objection to the system of checkpoints and settlement construction. The third supports Israel's security agenda in Gaza and the draconian Israeli-Egyptian restriction of imports sufficient only to meet minimal humanitarian needs – reconstruction aid is only offered on condition that it strengthens Mahmoud Abbas and weakens Hamas. And the final principle involves continuing the West Bank effort to strengthen Mahmoud Abbas by acting as paymaster for the Palestinian Authority (PA), while supporting a "counter-insurgency" strategy against Hamas, and prodding Israel to make marginal concessions to PA security services as part of a "performance-based" effort aimed at moving toward Palestinian independence and an end to occupation.

Continued US support for these policies risks making those who promote them increasingly irrelevant to the march of events and to the real changes among the principal players that will define the policy choices of the future. Israel and Hamas, in particular, have evidenced the kind of dynamism and flexibility that have enabled them to establish a new Israeli‑Palestinian agenda that differs markedly in its diplomatic and security dimensions from the one promoted by the international community. It may still be possible for the international community to impose the diplomatic and security system defined by the Oslo agreements, the findings of the Mitchell commission, the road map, the Quartet principles and the Annapolis process – that is, to end the occupation and establish a Palestinian state next to Israel under secular Palestinian leadership which enjoys the support of both Israeli and Palestinian majorities. To do so, however, will require doing much more than more of the same.

The ongoing battle in Gaza has made the environment for such an effort far more difficult. Israel increasingly focuses on Hamas as its primary Palestinian threat and most important Palestinian interlocutor, rather than Fatah and Mahmoud Abbas, which, in Israel's view, have been "domesticated" by the peace process and whose interests, therefore, do not have to be seriously addressed. Israel waged war to force the Hamas‑led government and security forces in Gaza to accommodate a security agenda defined by Israel – to cease all missile strikes against Israel – without conceding Hamas's demand to open Gaza's borders, especially to Egypt (at Rafah). Hamas, in turn, demands an end to the economic "siege" and open borders as the price of a durable ceasefire.

Israel's decision not to attempt Hamas's removal from power in Gaza should dispel the illusion fortifying many in Fatah that Israel would support its return to power lost in the January 2005 election and the June 2007 debacle in Gaza. As a consequence, Fatah may now be more willing to entertain proposals that will win it a role in the provision of aid to Gaza and border operations commensurate with its reduced power.

Hamas now plays at the centre-stage of the century-old Palestinian battle against Israel. It survived the Israeli attack and successfully defended Gaza against an Israeli reoccupation. In contrast, Mahmoud Abbas and, more significantly, Fatah, were mere spectators in this latest Palestinian battle against Israel. In the aftermath of the war, Hamas's control of the government, bureaucracy and security arms in Gaza is undiminished. The "movement" remains intact despite its leadership losses, and its decision-making capacity has not been compromised. The integrity of Hamas's security forces has been impaired but there is ready evidence that it continues to exercise a monopoly of force in Gaza. It remains capable of projecting power, however feeble, against Israel. Hamas is also demonstrating an ability to provide for the burgeoning humanitarian requirements of the Gaza population, despite the continuation of the "siege". This situation establishes a threshold far above what Hamas's leaders defined as victory in the midst of the war.

Hamas's policy goals today remain almost identical to the prewar period: recognition by Israel, Egypt, and the international community as the responsible power in Gaza, without submitting to external diktats (the Quartet principles); maintaining and increasing a credible "resistance option" not to defeat Israel, which it recognises is impossible, but rather to alter the terms of the relationship with Israel in its favour; ending the siege and restoring Gaza's borders so that normal economic activity can resume; opening the Rafah border with Egypt as a strategic goal in order to establish a link with the world independent of Israel; and resolving the prisoner exchange issue with Israel according to its suggested formula.

As George Mitchell, President Barack Obama's lead negotiator in the region, has noted the immediate challenges facing the new US administration have been defined by the bitter contest between Israel and Hamas. The war has forced Israel to reconsider its previous policies on prisoner release and border operations. The prospects for an agreement on terms closer to those long favoured by Hamas are now better than before the war. However, there is as yet no agreement on a ceasefire because there is no agreement on ending the draconian import-export regime imposed by Israel with international support. Gaza's borders remain all but closed because Israel longs to divide Israel and the West Bank from Gaza, and end all economic ties with the area – no matter which Palestinians rule there – and because of Egypt's determination to resist Israel's intention to move Gaza into its economic and security orbit.

The diplomatic aspect of the Annapolis process has exhausted itself. Little remains of this effort except the security element managed by US and European security officials in cooperation with Israeli and Palestinian security forces. Witness the deafening silence that has greeted recent reports to Mitchell by outgoing prime minister Ehud Olmert of his conditional offer of Palestinian statehood and settlement evacuation.

During the war in Gaza, PA security forces in the West Bank performed well and according to script under extreme and unprecedented pressure in a successful effort to minimise public protest and unrest. Their motivation for doing so, however, was not so much a desire to protect Israeli interests or to safeguard Palestinians from IDF entry into the streets, as it was to demonstrate to the international community and particularly to the US that they have upheld their part of the Oslo-Mitchell commission/road map/Annapolis bargain, and that they now expect a payoff in the form of more security space to call their own, real progress towards settlement evacuation, as well as an end to occupation, and independence.

An American policy that results in the timely realisation of these Palestinian demands, which have been endorsed by the international community, is the only effective means for reviving the fortunes of secular Palestinian nationalists. Israel and Hamas have chosen another road. They are not waiting for Washington, but are creating new methods of confrontation, dialogue, and uneasy accommodation as they write the next chapters in the ongoing conflict.